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Saturday, January 21, 2006

London Mourns

Posted by on January 21 at 12:08 PM

When a whale is tired of London…

The northern bottle-nosed whale that strayed into the River Thames in central London two days ago has died.

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Brits Eat Whale Meat and Blubber: I found the following here: http://www.nwaonline.net/articles/2006/01/04/living/the_back_burner/04abby.txt

The English could buy whale meat during World War II. A book called "Patsy; Learn to Cook By Pictures" told how to make fried whale steak and stewed whale meat. (The book stressed that "no points" were needed to purchase it; i.e., the whale meat was not a rationed food.)

"And, Patsy, you'll find it jolly good," states the narrator of the comic strip cooking class. "We promise you whale meat will make a good curry, too, and you can make hamburgers out of it -- if you put it through the mincer -- and a rattling good whale-meat-and-onion pie or pudding -- with kidney, if you can get it. But don't try roasting it -- it doesn't work."

"And all the while the thick-lipped leviathan is rushing through the deep, leaving tons of tumultuous white curds in his wake, and causing the slight boat to rock in the swells like a skiff caught nigh the paddle-wheels of an ocean steamer. Thus, the foreground is all raging commotion; but behind, in admirable artistic contrast, is the glassy level of a sea becalmed, the drooping unstarched sails of the powerless ship, and the inert mass of a dead whale, a conquered fortress, with the flag of capture lazily hanging from the whale-pole inserted into his spout-hole."

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